Across the Zodiac eBook

“I am sorry,” he went on, “that
neither my son nor myself can accompany you to-morrow.
All the elder members of my family are engaged to
attend at some distance hence before the hour at which
you can return. But I should not like you to
be alone with strangers; and, independently of this
consideration, I should perhaps have asked of you
a somewhat unusual favour. My daughter Eveena,
who, like most of our women” (he laid
a special emphasis on the pronoun) “has received
a better education than is now given in the public
academies, has been from the first greatly interested
in your narrative and in all you have told us of the
world from which you come. She is anxious to see
your vessel, and I had hoped to take her when I meant
to visit it in your company. But after to-morrow
I cannot tell when you may be summoned to visit the
Campta, or whether after that visit you are likely
to return hither. I will ask you, therefore, if
you do not object to what I confess is an unusual
proceeding, to take Eveena under your charge to-morrow.”

“Is it,” I inquired, “permissible
for a young lady to accompany a stranger on such an
excursion?”

“It is very unusual,” returned my host;
“but you must observe that here family ties
are, as a rule, unknown. It cannot be usual for
a maiden to be attended by father or brother, since
she knows neither. It is only by a husband that
a girl can, as a rule, be attended abroad. Our
usages render such attendance exceedingly close, and,
on the other hand, forbid strangers to interrupt or
take notice thereof. In Eveena’s presence
the Regent will find it difficult to draw you into
conversation which might be inconvenient or dangerous;
and especially cannot attempt to gratify, by questioning
you, any curiosity as to myself or my family.”

“But,” I said, “from what you say,
it seems that the Regent and any one who might accompany
him would draw inferences which might not be agreeable
to you or to the young lady.”

“I hardly understand you,” he replied.
“The only conjecture they could make, which
they will certainly make, is that you are, or are about
to be, married to her; and as they will never see
her again, and, if they did, could not recognise her—­as
they will not to-morrow know anything save that she
belongs to my household, and certainly will not speak
to her—­I do not see how their inference
can affect her. When I part with her, it will
be to some one of my own customs and opinions; and
to us this close confinement of girls appears to transcend
reasonable restraint, as it contradicts the theoretical
freedom and equality granted by law to the sex, but
utterly withheld by the social usages which have grown
out of that law.”

“I can only thank you for giving me a companion
more agreeable than the official who is to report
upon my reality,” I said.

“I do not desire,” he continued, “to
bind you to any reserve in replying to questions,
beyond what I am sure you will do without a pledge—­namely,
to avoid betraying more than you can help of that
which is not known outside my own household. But
on this subject I may be able to speak more fully
after to-morrow. Now, if you will come into the
peristyle, we shall be in time for the evening meal.”